The Shadow Howlers

After a quick shower, Bianca put on a dark green sundress with sandals. She didn’t typically wear dresses but wanted to make a good impression at her first pack dinner. When she walked out of the bedroom, she didn’t need to count the doors to Polly’s room. She just followed the squeals of laughter. Bianca stopped at the door and giggled at what she saw.

Gunnar was sitting on the floor next to a tiny table where Trisha and Polly were serving tea. He was sipping his tea with his pinkie finger sticking out. What made it even funnier was they had him wearing a

fancy white hat and makeup. His lips and some of his face were bright pink. He had dark red on his cheeks, and his eyes and eyebrows were blue. Bianca pulled out her phone and took a picture just as they noticed her. Trisha jumped up and ran to her.

“I love this place. Can I stay here?” She asked eagerly. Bianca picked her up and kissed her makeup-covered face.

“I’m going to see what I can do to keep you here, okay?” Trisha nodded and jumped down to join her new friend at the little table.

“Hello, luna. I’m sorry if you’re looking for your mate. He’s stepped out for a few minutes. My name is Geraldine,” Gunnar spoke with a southern woman’s accent, making her and the girls laugh.

“It’s nice to meet you, ma’am.” She answered, holding her hand out. He grabbed her and pulled her into his lap. Bianca laughed when he started kissing her all over her neck, leaving pink lipstick marks everywhere. Polly and Trish thought it was hysterical. They jumped on Bianca as Gunnar fell backward, and they were all wrestling on the ground. Everyone was laughing so hard they couldn’t catch their breath.

“What in tarnation is going on in here?” Bianca jumped up when she heard a woman at the door. Polly ran over to the older woman excitedly.

“Gram, this is Bianca, Uncle Gunny’s mate. She brought her sister Trisha, and she’s my best friend. We were having tea,” Bianca looked nervously at Gunnar’s mother, worried she wouldn’t like her. Her apprehension faded away quickly when her face lit up.

“You found your mate? That’s wonderful.” Bianca walked over to Gunnar’s mother, holding her hand out., but she pushed it aside, wrapping her arms around her. “No handshakes. You’re family, dear. It’s nice to meet you. I’m Marisa.”

“It’s nice to meet you too,” Bianca answered when Marisa released her. She looked toward Trisha, who was staring at the striking woman nervously.

“You must be Trisha,” She asked, and the little pup nodded. Marisa beamed as she dropped to her knees and hugged her. “Welcome to the family, little one. I hope you can help keep Polly in line.”

“Graaaaam,” Polly groaned dramatically. Bianca felt tears in her eyes. This is what a family was supposed to be like. The pack she and Trisha came from didn’t act like this. Her mother and father wouldn’t play with either of them. They weren’t loving and warm. She was going to do whatever was necessary to keep Trisha with her. Gunnar noticed her tears and came to her side.

“What’s wrong?” He asked. Bianca turned to him with a smile.

“These are happy tears. I can’t believe how amazing your family is.” Marisa heard what she said and stood up.

“What pack did you come from, dear?” She asked. Gunnar quickly explained the events from that morning. Marisa looked between the two and frowned.

“I knew he had a girlfriend there, but this seems extreme. Have you talked to Omar yet? I think you should get his side of the story and see what he says.” When she saw Bianca’s eyes widen in fear, she quickly explained. “I’m not saying he should have approached your pack like that. I’m just saying I’ve known Omar a long time, and I think there may be more to his actions.”

“We haven’t talked to him yet. We’ll go speak to him now before dinner. Can you watch the girls?” Gunnar asked his mother. When Bianca was getting ready to say she would stay, he grabbed her hand, shaking his head. He was reminding her that they were doing everything together.

“Of course, I’ll stay with my grandchildren. You don’t have to ask,” she said. She pushed them out of the room and went over to the little ones. Gunnar stopped and turned around.

“Mom, when you were pregnant, was there any way you wouldn’t have known?” He asked, glancing at Bianca, who was focused on his mother. Marisa looked at them with a frown.

“That’s an odd question, but the answer is no. As soon as I came out of my heat, I knew. Why do you ask?” Gunnar knew Bianca wouldn’t want to say anything in front of Trisha, so he mindlinked his mom.

“Bianca’s mother said she didn’t know she was pregnant with Trisha until the day she had her. I find that strange. Bianca was away at school, so she doesn’t know what happened.” Marisa nodded and looked between the sisters.

“Find out, son. They’re family now, and we need to protect our family.” Gunnar nodded and pulled Bianca from the room just as his dad walked in. Cyril smiled at the couple.

“So, I hear you’ve found your mate,” he said. He looked at Bianca, who smiled. He looked more like Gunnar’s brother than his dad.

“Dad, this is Bianca, and the little pup over there is her sister Trisha.” Bianca held her hand out to him, but he pulled her in for a hug that made her feel like a little girl. She’d never been hugged by her father, and the kind gesture brought tears to her eyes again. Cyril noticed, and his face fell.

“I’m sorry, Bianca. I didn’t mean to hurt or scare you,” She smiled at the concern in his voice.

“It’s not that. The pack we’re from is different than this one. A man would never hug a woman, not even his own daughters. The kindness of everyone in this pack overwhelms me.” Cyril looked around at the others and figured he would ask them later about her pack.

“We’re happy to have you here. Where are you off to? Dinner will be ready soon,” he said.

“Mom will explain. We’ll be back in time.” As they headed toward the stairs, Bianca stopped him.

“Uh, you may want to wash that makeup off your face. You don’t look too intimidating with blue eye shadow and pink lips.” He started laughing and led her to their room. They quickly washed their faces, and Gunnar changed into jeans and a T-shirt.

When they got to the dungeons, two guards stood outside. They nodded at Gunnar and Bianca before opening the doors. Inside, it was a typical dungeon with stone walls and cells. However, these cells had silver lining the doors on the inside, so the werewolves couldn’t break out of them.

They approached the cell where Omar was sitting on a cot with his head in his hands. He didn’t notice they were there until Gunnar spoke.

“Omar, we need to talk to you,” he said. The warrior looked up in surprise, quickly becoming confused when he saw Bianca. He had been taken away before Gunnar had declared her his mate. He stood up and walked over, careful not to touch the bars of the cell.

“Alpha, I’m sorry. I thought I could take care of them myself. I was dating Natalie, but that’s not why I wanted to go after the pack. The proof that I showed you was real. I stumbled on the evidence when I was sneaking in and out of the pack. When we arrived, I realized many people in the pack were innocent, so I didn’t dispute Natalie’s claims. You know me, Gunnar. We grew up together. I would never kill innocents for something as stupid as jealousy.” Bianca saw the tears forming in his eyes. She believed him. He looked broken.

“This is my mate Bianca. She’s the daughter of Alpha Karl. We’re going to take you to the interrogation room, and I want you to tell us everything. Where’s the evidence? I’m going to have someone get it and bring it to us. Maybe she can see things in it we can’t.” Omar looked at Bianca with sorrow in his eyes.

“Everything is on my desk in my office. There’s a box that says Last Moon. I’m sorry, luna, for coming to your pack as I did.” Omar looked down at the ground.

“At least something good came out of it.” Omar glanced up at her in confusion as she smiled. “I found my mate.”

Gunnar mindlinked one of the guards to go to Omar’s office and grab the box of evidence. He then had Omar taken to the interrogation room, where he and Bianca sat across from the warrior. Once the box came, Gunnar looked at it in shock. He hadn’t realized how much evidence Omar had collected.

“Why didn’t you show me all of this before? You only showed me little pieces that could have been easily manipulated.” He asked Omar.

“I didn’t really know what I had. Maybe you can make heads or tails of it. I thought the images of the humans were enough.” Gunnar started pulling things out of the box and laying them on the table. There were many photos and copies of documents. Bianca was focused on the pictures.

“I know some of these people. The men are my dad’s warriors. I don’t know who’s with them, though. The girl in this picture is an omega from another pack. She’s deaf and mute.” Bianca couldn’t believe what she was seeing, but she also didn’t understand what it meant. Omar looked at her sadly.

“The people with the warriors are humans from a nearby town. The omega was kidnapped from a pack that was near the town. I think she was a witness, but with her being deaf and mute, they decided to keep her rather than kill or sell her.” Bianca stared at him as tears ran down her face. She remembered when the omega showed up, her dad said she had escaped an abusive family, so they let her work in the kitchen. Bianca had tried to communicate with her many times, but someone always stopped her.

“What are these?” She pointed to a stack of papers that Gunnar was looking through.

“They look like sales receipts. They marked the purchases as merchandise. I believe these are proof of them selling humans.” He showed her what he was looking at, which also looked suspicious to Bianca. Then she had a thought.

“Can you go back to March four years ago?” Omar’s head shot up, and he looked at her.

“Why then?” He asked anxiously.

“I have a four-year-old sister who appeared out of nowhere four years ago. I’m curious to see if she was taken from somewhere. Do you know something?” Bianca asked, and he nodded.

“March four years ago, a pack was attached. The pack was so small it made The Last Moon Pack look big. Everyone except the pups was killed. Most of the pups were sold off; I don’t know what happened to the rest of them. There are some pictures in the box of the pack prior to being attacked.” Omar said.

Bianca looked through the box and found the pictures. She spotted Trisha right away in the arms of a woman with long red hair next to a man who must be her mate; both were beaming down at their pup. Even then, Trisha had a head full of red hair. They kidnapped Trisha and kept her as their own. Even worse, they killed her parents.

“This is Trisha with her parents.” She handed Gunnar the picture. His face hardened as he put his arm around her.

“I’m so sorry, Bianca. This ends now. Omar, we’re going back to Last Moon, but we need to be careful. With what happened this morning, they’re going to be on alert. We’ll surround them and move in from all sides. We’re not killing anyone. We’ll put them in their own dungeons and call the king so he can sort this mess out. I want to separate the innocent from the guilty.” He looked at Bianca, who was still staring at the picture of her sister?

“I need to tell Trisha, but not until she’s older. I want to go with you. I know the pack. Most of the women are probably innocent. The men treated them like they were too dumb to do anything, so I’m sure they weren’t involved with the humans. However, I don’t know why my mom agreed to lie about Trisha.” She felt her blood boil at what had been going on right under her nose. Gunnar kissed her forehead.

“Of course, you’re going with me. We’re partners. We’ll talk to your mom. Maybe once Karl is in the dungeon, she’ll be more forthcoming. Let’s go back to the pack house to tell my parents and have them watch the girls. Are you okay?” He asked as they stood up. She shook her head.

“I’m mad as hell that I didn’t see any signs of what was happening and didn’t question my mom when Trisha showed up. I was just so happy to have a sister.” Bianca then turned to Gunnar with wide eyes. “What about me? Am I really their daughter?”

“We’ll find out. Let’s go.” The three of them headed to the pack house, where everyone was getting ready for dinner. None of them felt like eating, so they grabbed some sandwiches to take on the road. When Bianca saw Trisha on Cyril’s shoulders giggling, she almost broke down. Her parents had robbed her of her real parents. She couldn’t wait to see them and discover what else they’d lied about.

“Trisha, I’m going somewhere with Gunnar. I’ll be back later. Will you be okay?” she asked the little pup, who nodded happily.

“I love it here and never want to leave. You know I have a gram and gramps now? Marisa and Cyril said I can call them that, just like Polly. Is that okay?” Trisha looked at Bianca pleadingly from her spot on Cyril’s shoulders.

“That’s fine, sweetheart. You’ll never have to leave. You’re going to stay here with us.” Bianca looked at Cyril, who gave her a small smile. Gunnar had mindlinked the pack to let them know what was happening. They hadn’t marked each other yet, so she hadn’t been able to hear them.

“We’ll take care of her. You take care of the others. Your family will be here waiting for you when you come back.” Bianca stood on her tiptoes and kissed Cyril’s cheek.

“You don’t know how much that means to me.” She said with a small smile.

Gunnar pulled her away, and they ran outside to the jeep. All of the warriors were going with them. A long line of cars was heading toward Last Moon. Bianca held Gunnar’s hand as they drove. It had only been hours since she left her pack, but it felt like days with all that had happened.

When they got close to the pack lands, the other cars parked on the road, and they shifted to their wolves. Bianca and Gunnar drove up to the pack house. Karl, Anara, and several guards were waiting for them. When they got out of the car, Bianca walked up to the steps.

“Hello, Karl,” She said with a smirk. He didn’t flinch. Instead, he looked at her with pure hatred.

“We’ve been expecting you,” He said, and she heard the pack mindlink.

“They’re here. Attack!”